Lecture Notes on Rectifiable Reifenberg for Measures

Abstract

These series of notes serve as an introduction to some of both the classical and modern techniques in Reifenberg theory. At its heart, Reifenberg theory is about studying general sets or measures which can be, in one sense or another, approximated on all scales by well behaved spaces, typically just Euclidean space itself. Such sets and measures turn out not to be arbitrary, and often times come with special structure inherited from what they are being approximated by. We will begin by recalling and proving the standard Reifenberg theorem, which says that sets in Euclidean space which are well approximated by affine subspaces on all scales must be homoemorphic to balls. These types of results have applications to studying the regular parts of solutions of nonlinear equations. The proof given is designed to move cleanly over to more complicated scenarios introduced later. The rest of the lecture notes are designed to introduce and prove the Rectifiable Reifenberg Theorem, including an introduction to the relevant concepts. The Rectifiable Reifenberg Theorem roughly says that if a measure $μ$ is summably close on all scales to affine subspaces $L^k$, then $μ=μ^++μ^k$ may be broken into pieces such that $μ^k$ is $k$-rectifiable with uniform Hausdorff measure estimates, and $μ^+$ has uniform bounds on its mass. These types of results have applications to studying the singular parts of solutions of nonlinear equations. The proof given is designed to give a baby introduction to ways of thinking in more modern PDE analysis, including an introduction to Neck regions and their Structure Theory.